Monthly Archive for January, 2011

Western Shoshone lead prayer at the Nevada Test Site. Photo by Jim Haber

Las Vegas, NV, January 29, 2011 — Marking the 60th year since the first atomic bomb was tested on land belonging to the Western Shoshone National Council, near Indian Springs, Nevada, eight activists stepped onto the land and were immediately arrested by Nye County sheriffs.

The Western Shoshone National Council had issued permits for the activists to enter their land. “You bless the land with each of your footsteps,” said Johnnie Bobb, a leader of the Western Shoshone Nation. Taken into custody immediately after stepping onto the land were: George Homanich, Judy Homanich, Mary Lou Anderson, Renee Espeland, Brian Terrell, Denis DuVall, Jim Haber and Jerry Zawada.

Back in November of 1984, Helen was part of the Silo Pruning Hooks action. She went to a Missouri nuclear missile silo along with Larry Cloud-Morgan, Fr. Carl Kabat OMI and Fr. Paul Kabat OMI. With sledgehammer and jackhammer, the group followed the biblical mandate of Isaiah to turn swords into plowshares. They were convicted and received a varied number of years of prison time for their action.

With the exception of a few days, Helen has been in prison ever since. (A couple of times in past years when released, she immediately engaged in an action that resulted in arrest and being returned directly to prison for violating parole.)

She is scheduled to be released in September of 2011 after 27 years behind bars.

Las Vegas — On Thursday, January 27, activists charged with trespass, along with their supporters, filled Judge Jansen’s courtroom to hear his verdict regarding their April, 2009 protest at Creech Air Force Base. Crews at Creech control the drones used in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, killing civilians in remote controlled assassination attacks.

In a 20-page written decision, Judge William Jansen found the fourteen guilty of trespass as charged, ruling that their defense did not meet the legal requirement of imminence for acquittal based on necessity.

Before being sentenced, twelve made statements calling for an end to the drone bombings and for nonviolent ways of resolving international conflict. The Creech 14 were arrested during an April 2009 demonstration at Creech Air Force Base in Indian Springs, Nevada, protesting the remote piloting of armed killer drones from Creech in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Georgina Smith and Helen John painted “Genocide”, “NO More War Crimes”, “No Upgrade”, “Respect the War Dead”, and “Art, Law, Morality” on the walls outside of the High Court on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile on Remembrance Day 2006. The action was a protest against the High Court’s complicity in the illegal deployment of the genocidal nuclear weapon system by ruling it legal in the Lord Advocates Reference of 2000. In addition their action condemned the Scottish legal system for holding people who blockaded during Faslane365 for up to thirty hours before releasing them without charge.

Georgina is a veteran anti-nuclear campaigner who took part in the decade long women’s encampment at Greenham Common which ultimately ended when US Cruise missiles were removed. The painting was part of the year-long Faslane365 campaign

Nearly seventy-five people gathered in front of Lockheed Martin’s Valley Forge, Pennsylvania complex in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania on January 17, the federal holiday observance of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

A half block long line of people, holding banners and signs and standing next to large self-standing pictures of Dr. King, chanted “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice”, heard Jane Dugdale of Main Line Peace Action speak about the military budget, and listened to the extended audio broadcast of excerpts of sermons and speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. A bell tolled after a Litany of the King Day Memorial (see below) as eight people, prepared to be arrested in civil disobedience, walked into the crossing of the Lockheed Martin main driveway.

Chris Cole was jailed for 30 days on January 19 for non-payment of a fine relating to a protest at the DSEI arms fair in 2009. With statutory credit, he was released from prison on February 2. His pre-prison reflections follow.

It’s Just the Way Things Are by Chris Cole

January 18, 2011

In 2009 the Defence & Security Equipment International (DSEI) exhibition was due to hold its bi-annual arms selling jamboree in East London, opening with a conference at the Queen Elizabeth Conference centre in central London. According to its official brochure, the aim of the ‘UK Defence Conference 2009 ’ was to bring together “senior officials from the arms industry, the military and the UK government” to “explore the business opportunities” to be found in “global security threats such as climate change, major population movements, growing water scarcity, competition for energy sources and the continued rise of Islamism.” Here then, was another opportunity to confront the UK’s military-industrial complex as it gathered together at the beginning of their week-long arms spree.

So with spray can in hand I went to the conference centre just before the event and sprayed ‘build peace not war machines’, ‘stop this bloody business’ and ‘arms trade=death’ on the front entrance and poured fake blood over the steps. (See CCTV footage here). I was shortly convicted of criminal damage and fined just under £2,000. Eighteen months (and numerous court letters, bailiffs threats and visits) later it’s time to go back to court to explain my actions and why I won’t pay the fine.

Your help is needed in pressing the following demands: End the inhumane, degrading conditions of pre-trial confinement and respect Bradley’s human rights. Specifically, lift the “Prevention of Injury (POI) watch order”. This would allow Bradley meaningful physical exercise, uninterrupted sleep during the night, and a release from isolation. We are not asking for “special treatment”. In fact, we are demanding an immediate end to the special treatment.

THIS JUST IN: Two hundred supporters protested outside of the Quantico, Virginia brig on January 17, 2011, in order to rally in support of Bradley Manning and oppose the inhumane conditions of his pre-trial confinement.

Eighty three people from the Center participated in a vigil at the Kitsap Mall in Silverdale with the help of a full scale, 44 foot long, inflatable Trident D-5 missile. Each D-5 missile, deployed on Trident nuclear submarines, carries up to 8 warheads, each with an explosive yield of up to 475 kilotons. Each D-5 missile costs approximately $60 million.

Participants carried signs and banners calling for an end to war and nuclear weapons. Notable was a quote by Dr. King: “When scientific power outruns moral power, we end up with guided missiles and misguided men.”